Editor’s Column: Don’t Stop the Party

Welcome to the gayest time of year! It’s once again time for Pride! Pride means a lot of things for a lot of different people. I talked last year about how Pride was a big part of the reason I came out because I wanted to be part of this celebration of who I was. But Pride is more than a celebration. As a popular slogan reminds us, the first Pride was a riot. And, perhaps this year, in the wake of Donald Trump’s harshly bigoted policies towards the LGBTQ+ community, that riotous spirit is coming alive again. But this is a special Pride for me because, last year, I sadly had to miss all the festivities.

You see, my father died last March. It was hard to say goodbye, but he was 89 when he died and had lived a very full, long life with three marriages, five children, and a lot of great stories to tell. I was far more prepared for my dad’s death than I was for my mom’s back in 2007, as she was only 58 when she died and passed very suddenly from lung cancer. My dad has always stated that, when he died, he wished to have his ashes scattered in Central Park in New York. My stepmom told him on his deathbed that she’d gladly fulfill his wishes, but she wasn’t doing it in the winter. So my stepmom waited until it warmed up a little bit to get the family together to scatter his ashes. It just so happened that my father’s birthday fell in June, so the ceremony was scheduled for the day of his birthday, which just so happened to fall on the same weekend as Denver Pride.

There’s no question in my mind that I made the right choice to join my family in scattering my dad’s ashes rather than going to celebrate my identity in a park for a weekend. Obviously, my dad had to come first, and it’s a decision I would make again. But I can’t deny that I was a little frustrated that I had to make a choice between the two in the first place and couldn’t take part in both. I missed the traditions that I hold so dear, including manning the OFM booth at Denver PrideFest, going out dancing at Tracks for the Women’s Pride Party, and, of course, getting to see the parade make its way down Colfax Avenue.

So, for this year’s Pride, I feel like I’m making up for lost time, and I intend to make the most of it. One thing that I learned last year is how much Pride feeds my soul and how much good it does for my mental health to celebrate the queer community. It may seem like there’s little to celebrate this year as Trump is systematically stripping rights from the trans community with the backing of a far-right Supreme Court that he packed with the help of manipulative scheming from the Republican Party. But I think that’s all the more reason why we need to celebrate this year.

Yes, the first Pride was a riot, but it was a riot because the cops got in the way of our party. We’ve fought long and hard to carve out a space in society where the LGBTQ+ community can come together to celebrate the resilience and strength of our community, and we’re not going to let that go just because a billionaire with an inferiority complex is throwing a hissy fit over our very existence. Every time we gather together and celebrate, we remind the world, the country, and Donald Trump in particular that they can’t get in the way of queer joy. We will find our joy in the darkest of times, and we will flaunt it in front of whomever is made the most uncomfortable by it.

So, while it may seem like there’s little to celebrate, we have to remember that Trump wants us to have nothing to be happy about, to have no community to lean on, to have no identity to be proud of. Every time we put on a big party for Pride Month, we’re flying in the face of what Trump wants, and that just makes me want to dance my queer ass off even more. And this year, I’m remembering what it was like to go a year without this celebration, and I’m clinging to my queer joy with all my might. Think of your Pride celebration as part of a protest, and much like the patrons of Stonewall in 1969, don’t let anyone stop our party.

Julie River
Associate Editor